From Wealth Mgt to Sustainable Agriculture: the inspiring journey of Philippe Benoit Du Rey

Not every career path follows a predictable trajectory. Often, the subject you study at university does not dictate your ultimate career choice, and these unexpected journeys are often the most inspiring. Philippe Benoit Du Rey, who completed his Master's in Wealth Management and Certificate in Sustainable Development and Social Innovation at the University of Luxembourg, is a prime example. Rather than pursuing a career in banking, he founded a company dedicated to providing low-carbon fertilisers to farmers. Curious to know why? Read on to discover his story.

Why did you decide to come to Luxembourg for your studies?

I had a real estate agency in France and some big international clients needed to get advice on wealth management and banking schemes before purchasing high end properties so I was looking for a good quality training in wealth management. I found on the internet that the University of Luxembourg had a top programme in this, so I applied and was accepted. I did it part time in order to be able to manage my companies at the same time.

What was your journey after graduating? 

The end of the course was in spring 2015, and I had gotten an internship in a family office during my two years part time studies. I got a surprising call from a friend to become his export director and participate in large reforestation/anti-desertification programs. I said yes because it allowed me to manage my assets at the same time and the potential of profit was very nice. So I went to Rwanda, Mongolia, Namibia, Brazil, Australia, Philippines, New Zealand, Morocco and other countries. It was very enjoyable doing good and doing business at the same time. But eventually I wanted to travel less, to be more with my family, so I created my current company end of 2017. I still, however, manage the distributors that I signed during this time, it takes only one day per week on average. 

I had several great experiences while traveling. The FAO Asia Pacific Forestry Week in Philippines, with all the leaders of forestry in this part of the world, was a very nice experience, as well as traveling with an open deck car in throughout Australia to make the trip more "green". In Mongolia, I gave a conference in the best hotel in Ulan Bataar on the same day as the meeting of the G7 finance ministers. Some of them joined my conference and I had dinner with them afterwards, it was very nice!

What do you do now?

While developing my company, I do also conferences to train farmers, foresters and elected officials on "the resilient farm", "the resilient forest", “the resilient sponge city" and I realised that the techniques to make soils fertile again were not known here. I launched a call to establish the Luxembourg Agribusiness Association and that is what we did with friends.

The target is to help the Luxembourg Financial Centre catch up in this class of assets, knowing that compared to Singapore for instance, Luxembourg is, according to its size, underperforming by more than 300 billion € in this sector!

What is the next big thing for you?

We are organising a conference in March about forests, Carbon, and Natural Capital, which has already attracted the largest players in the world as is the largest conference of this type in the EU. Now that Luxembourg exists on the world map of agribusiness, we want to grow this sector, develop partnerships abroad and create other world class events. Another world class event that we will organise in 2026 will be announced next week, so stay tuned at www.agribusiness.lu!